


Draw The Blinds On Yesterday

by Mellaithwen



Category: Life on Mars (UK)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-04-10
Updated: 2007-04-10
Packaged: 2018-01-14 19:16:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1277788
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mellaithwen/pseuds/Mellaithwen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam's past, present and future's all start to bleed into one another, and it's time for him to make a choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Draw The Blinds On Yesterday

 

 

*-*-*

There are only two pictures on the wheel, well, two pictures,  _repeated_  again and again, one after the other. It’s a good job you’ve never been one for motion sickness because all you can see is the wheel turning and a jingle sings in your ear. A xylophone being bopped. A trumpet playing, all to the same familiar sound.

The pictures look almost hastily painted, clever drawings of a man in a suit and a man...

Dressed as you were yesterday, in your ‘70’s garb.

You haven’t worn the suit, however, since you passed out on the road, asphalt on your lips, tiny stones digging into your cheek and a white out that lead you to an empty building site and  _Life on Mars_  playing on the 8 track instead of your iPod.

The wheel jams. Only half of both pictures can be seen. The future and the past.

_“Inside the shop, as if by magic, the shop keeper appeared...”_

“Good morning Sam, how nice to see you again. What would you like to be today?”

The shop keeper—who bares a striking resemblance to Ray—steps back, gesturing towards the fitting room behind him. Only the door changes and looks more and more like a  _new_  door. A panel appearing within covered in webbed glass as hospital personnel pass by.

You turn to the shopkeeper and find the girl instead. Blonde and smiling, clown in hand.

“Choose a path you wish to follow, choose before your heart’s made hollow.” She hisses, prodding you hard in the shoulder, waking you up in time to hear the Guv' race through your offices, and Chris standing above you, poking you. In the shoulder.

“You okay, boss?”

You mumble an incoherent reply and promptly avoid Ray—even more so than usual—for the rest of the day.

*-*-*

Your desk drawer is filled with half working, fully working and completely banjaxed radios. The ones with the wires hanging by a thread, tussled and broken, held together by tape and covered in holes...they seem to be the most successful for picking up signals from the future.

_Yes, that’s not crazy at all, is it Sam? What next? A hat made of tin foil?_

You’re more than a little concerned when the little voice in your own head begins to doubt you. 

At night before you dream, you ask yourself,  _if this is real, what am I_? 

And stuff like that’s never good to go around asking...

*-*-*

“Maya wasn’t even born when...DCI Hunt came and told me, I even went to see you then too. Remembered what you’d told me. Music, touch, voices, anything familiar.”

You toss and turn beneath curled and twisted sheets. Tied and stuck, you can only listen, you can’t see.

“She’s gone Sam; you know that, don’t you? I think you do. I think you know a lot more than you’ve been letting on.”

“You said—almost can’t believe I remember it, I can’t believe I never...” She clears her throat. You know who it is. “You said that there are moments when people can sense...well  _you_ , I suppose. You must have been talking about  _you_.”

She touches your hand gently, hesitantly.

She expected something, you know.

She’s talking and she’s familiar and the music’s faint in the background of Bowie tracks played through a high-volume iPod. She knows all of this because you told her thirty years previous.

“I wish there was more I could do, Sam. You helped me out and I’m just standing here. And I don’t understand, not even a little bit. But you’ve got to decide if you want to wake up, Sam. Your mum, she needs you to choose.”

You wake up as the empty whisky glass falls from your hand and rolls under the bed. 

You can’t be labelled insane now. You’re sure.

*-*-*

_It’s the end of the world as we know it, it’s the end of the world as we know it, it’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fiiine._

“Oh come on, this isn’t even from the seventies!” You complain as you turn the knobs of the radio off, partly unwilling to be a puppet in someone’s game.

“Hey, I was listening to that!” Ray complains and your hand freezes in getting the case file. The last time you heard music on the radio; Pulp, inside of an Indian restaurant, the Guv’ had no idea what you were on about and later explained to you that the signal never once wavered and your name was certainly not spoken.

“You heard that?”

“Course I ‘eard it, now put it back on.”

You do as you’re told numbly; half afraid of what you (and Ray) might hear when the signal clears, but it isn’t R.E.M, it’s the DJ’s interjection in between and he says nothing about the song he just played.

“Bloody missed it now.” Ray grumbles and you swallow the bile in your throat. Your world, your time, it’s bleeding through into this one and people are starting to take notice.

“Well, shit.”

*-*-*

There are red shoes in lost and found. They’re your size; and you only know that because you checked the bottom for a tag of some kind. They’ve been tossed on the shelf but there’s not an inkling of dust on the leather. They’re flawless.

“Chris? What are these?”

“They’re shoes, boss.” He replies, helpfully, chewing gum absently.

“Yeah, I gathered that. Are they evidence? Are they actually lost?” 

Because the lost and found is also the interrogation room, you see.

“Oh, not sure boss. Don’t remember anyone coming in with them, though.” He scrunches up his nose in thought and you stare at the ceiling’s reflection in the leather’s shine.

Hours later, you try them on. You whisper insults to yourself and hope to god no one catches you.

_“The Wizard will sort it out, because of all the wonderful things he does.”_

You click the red shoes together once, twice, three times, muttering, whispering, and murmuring, “There’s no place like home, there’s no place like home.”

And nothing happens.

So you try a different approach.

“There’s no place like 2007, there’s no place like 2007, there’s no place like—”

“Tyler!” Gene calls from outside and you kick the shoes into the corner so quickly that your toes ache.

“Nice try, Sam.” The corner replies and suddenly you’re not alone. You look up warily to see the girl standing a hair’s breath away. She smiles eerily, before glaring.

“But why do you keep trying to leave?” She asks, like a petulant child. A spoilt brat,  _but why, but why, but why?_

“Tyler!”

You wake up with a start and pull the paper down from being stuck to your cheek.

“This isn’t a sleepover, you dozy git, get a move on!”

The pain isn’t immediate but as soon as you get outside, and whip your head against the wind a little too quickly; your body cries out and sends signal upon signal to your brain, pain, pain, pain. It must be from falling asleep at your desk because from your neck down and across your shoulder blades, your muscles are aching.

“What’s wrong with you?” Gene asks, kicking the Cortina into action as you tumble in completely devoid of grace.

“Don’t know. Feels like I got hit by a car.” You moan, rubbing your neck and bowing your head.

Then you hear what you’ve just said and you stop the movement abruptly. You look up and frown. You can practically feel the bruising deep on your skin beneath your shirt and vest.

  
_Shit_.

*-*-*

“Haven’t you got anything a little stronger?” You ask grimacing back at the station when your patrol of the Manchester streets is done.

You block out the dim sunlight with the palms of your hands, driving them deep into your eye sockets as though it’ll get rid of the pain you’re suffering from. You try not to think about how much the jolting of the Guv’s car speeding around corners made everything ten times worse.

“Oh I see; that’s how you know so much about the drug trade, eh, Tyler? Hyde sounds like a—”

“I didn’t mean that strong.”

“One skip ladeeda down the yellow brick road wasn’t enough? Need another trip down memory lane, do ya?”

“Would you shut up for  _five seconds_?” You shout and Gene narrows his eyes.

“You keep your voice down, Sammy-boy, or I’ll show you what real pain is, and it isn’t no nambi-pambi hangover either.”

“Trust me, this isn’t a hangover.”  _Hit by a car, hit by a car, hit by a car._

DCI Hunt turns and looks at you, his DI, really looks at you and sees what you cannot.

Face nearly gaunt; dark rings around and underneath your eyes, thick like the aftermath of a bar brawl with hard knuckled fists on tender skin that couldn’t parry the blow.

“Come on, get your coat.” Gene announces all of a sudden, patting Sam’s shoulder, and almost regretting it from the hiss of pain it elicits.

Almost.

“Well, what’re you waiting for?”

“Where are we even going?”

“There’s only one thing I know that’ll get rid of pain, Sam, and that’s drink.”

“Drink?”

“And lots of it.”

*-*-*

In the morning, the pain’s worse, and it’s not because you have a hangover to boot. It has nothing to do with Hunt finally getting his way and pushing you into drinking more and more until you were reaching for the bottle yourself.

It has nothing to do with the spotty memories of a cringe-worthy scene, whispered worries that you’re going to fail, that everything you thought were wrong might not be, might be misunderstood, ignorance and you won’t be okay, you won’t be alright, you can’t be, not here, can you?  _Can I?_

Nothing to do with that at all.

Every movement makes you nauseous and you already know without looking at your watch that you’re extremely late. The one time you might have benefited from a Gene Hunt wake up call and he isn’t even here to do it.

The worst of the aching that isn’t alcohol induced is coming from your back and it’s spreading. It’s starting to move along your spine like cars hurrying on the motorway making stops at junctions as it starts to wrap around your ribs.

You wonder if they’ll crack and break, you wonder how hard you hit the road, how hard the car hit you in the first place. All you can remember is laying there, a crescendo and a breath pushed out of you before sitting up  _here._

You curl in on yourself in an attempt to help, but it does nothing. The foetal position only pulls at the purple skin. You let out a hiss and dig your nails into the duvet beneath and it  _does nothing._

Just like last night’s drinking did nothing in the long term.

Nothing.

You untangle yourself from the blanket you don’t remember grabbing and get up from the bed you don’t remember crashing onto.

And that’s when you realise why your DCI isn’t barging down the door asking where the hell you are. Because DCI Gene Hunt is already  _in_  your flat, fast asleep in the arm chair overlooking the bed. Head dipped and drooling into his collar. Occasionally sniffing and snoring in his slumber.

You throw a shoe at him and get ready for work.

You throw the other at his chest when he still hasn’t gotten up and you pinch his nose and pull his ears until he mumbles “Ger’off.”

You groan and don your jacket, biting your lip against the hurt.

He’ll wake himself up promptly in around an hour. You’ll already be down the station, wincing at the harsh light when he’ll slam open the double doors, like he slams open everything else, and be none the worse for wear.

You don’t want to know how he does it, you just wish you could too.

*-*-*

The aching has started to ebb away and as long as you keep yourself distracted you think you’ll be fine. The bruising will fade and by the time you wake up the world will be a wonderful and shiny place...

“Sir, you dropped your mobile.”

You freeze where you stand.

  
_Mobile_ _,_  echoes in your head.  _Mobile_ _? Mobile what sir?_  You remember being asked.  _Your mobile hasn’t stopped ringing._  You remember Neil.  _Mobile_ _. Mobile. Mobile..._

You turn your head slowly at first as though you don’t believe you’ve heard anything at all.

“Sir?”

A plonk whose name you don’t know is smiling at you and in her hands is a radio that yes, you did drop. Well you must have, because what once was yours is now hers.

“It’s a radio.” You say, keeping your tone neutral in case you’d heard her wrong, in case she’d said just that and you’re having one of your moments where nothing’s real and the walls of time are thin enough for all sorts to fall in through the cracks.

“Didn’t think your Nokia had radio...?” She asks, genuinely surprised, turning the radio over and looking at it carefully.

“What?”

You make sure there’s a fair distance between you in case she’s talking to you about something else entirely and you’re just the nut-job in the corner...or she’s really saying all of this and then...well, then you’re still a nut-job in the corner, only she’s the devil incarnate.

“It’s ringing, Sam.” She says strangely, hand held aloft with the radio.

You flinch and nearly trip over your own shoes when she edges closer. Her eyes are staring right into yours and your hands shake because they’re those orbs of hers, they’re blue and shining and she knows and she’s there and  _oh shit_.

“Aren’t you going to answer it, Sam? It’s ringing.”

You look down at the radio, there’s crackling but no voice, it’s not ringing, it’s not a phone, there’s no one on the other end.

“Sam?”

“You can’t be...saying that. It’s my subconscious, it’s, it’s something else. You’re not saying it in real-life.” You mutter to console your own too-fast-beating-heart.

“Real life?” She smiles. “Is this real, Sam? Am I real? Are you? Can’t you hear it ring, Sam? Aren’t you listening anymore?”

You blink, she’s still there. You blink, she’s still there, and you shut your eyes so tightly that that it aches and all you can see is the spotting red behind your closed lids.

“Go away, go away, go away.”

“Doctor, he’s not responding, what should we do?”

A distant radio crackles through static and fuzz.

Beep, beep, beep.

“Sam?” A new voice, “What should we do, Sam? Can you hear me?”

“It’s ringing, Sam. Why won’t you answer? It could be important!” The WPC asks, footsteps clacking across the ground.

“No.” You whisper as the sounds encompass your hearing and you crash to your knees unsure of what to do. You’re dizzy all of a sudden and your chest tightens; it’s harder to breathe.

Black spots in the red.

“Sammy? Sam? Sam I Am? Answer, answer, answer the phone. The ringing won’t stop unless you answer the phone.”

“Anything?” A crackled seasoned voice asks, male, and far away.

“Nothing, doctor.” You hear a faint reply.

“Sam?”

“No, no, go away, I can’t, just-just leave me alone.”

Beep, beep, beep.

“Sam?” More insistant, harder footsteps, heavy and light, separate, different, two pairs on their way.

Beep, beep, beep.

“What should we do, Sam?”

“It’s ringing, Sam. Don’t keep them waiting.”

As soon as they touch you. Broad fingers pulling you up and slender ones that caress your face and try to stop you from fighting your DCI’s grip...

  
_Your_ DCI.

“Tyler!” You hear finally, and the buzzing disappears. The beeping is gone and the only woman near you is Annie, you can smell her. Distinctive mixture of perfume and shampoo.

You’re slumped in Gene Hunt’s never wavering grasp and now that you think about it, you realise how much it hurts your back to be doing so. When you open your eyes all you can see are the sudden spots of colour because you closed them so tightly. You sway for a second as your vision clears.

“Woah there, Sammy-boy, steady on.”

You listen to his words and notice the heavy burden in your pocket that means your radio never left you all along. You still haven’t stopped shaking and your hands only still as your eyes roll into the back of your head. The last thing you hear is a surprised grunt from Gene—now forced to take your entire body weight—and a shocked gasp from Annie as she sees you fall.

Other than that, it’s just the dark that claws at the sleeping man you have to worry about.

*-*-*

The light glistens on your eyelashes and for a moment it’s all you can see.

You’re down when before you were up.

No, _slumped,_  you were slumped, yes, yes that’s right.

But now you’re comfortable, with a mediocre row of chairs stacked in a line beneath you. A makeshift bed for the fainting idiot.

“Sam?”

Blurred dots of gold in your eyes distract you as they roll beneath your lids and alternate between opening and closing.

“Sam?”

There are too many voices calling your name,  _Mr Tyler, can you hear me? Mr Tyler?_  Quieter than Annie, and far less important, because Annie’s  _frantic_. Annie’s calling and grabbing at your clothes, and her eyes are glistening but not with gold. A clear, shining salty substance that falls from her wet lashes down her soft cheek.

You watch its trail with unfocused eyes as her slender fingers grasp your jaw tighter.

“Sam, look at me, look at me.”

She doesn’t know she’s all you can see. She doesn’t realise there’s nothing more.

“Oi, Cartwright ease up, you’ll scare the idiot back to sleep!”

You groan, and unbeknownst to your confused mind, it’s the best sound Annie thinks she’ll ever hear.

“Should get you to a hospital...” She mutters, fidgeting with your collar and jacket.

“No need.” You mumble, pulling yourself up and ignoring your body's twinge. Gene sees it. He doesn’t comment but he does put an intimidating yet calming hand on Annie’s shoulders.

“He’s alright, aren’t you Tyler?”

Somehow you know he isn’t asking for Annie’s benefit, and maybe not even his own, but he’s asking you all the same and you should never keep Gene Hunt waiting.

“I’m fine.” You smile. You’ve had enough of the doctors in your head; you certainly don’t want ones in real—

There’s that word again.  _Real_.

This is real, lying on chairs being taken care of, it’s real. Hell, it’s real in both times but...it’s real here. And you’re here. Annie’s lingering touch is real, Gene’s protective stance is real. Chris in the doorway pretending to work when really he just wants to understand what’s going on. Ray looking on with something you can’t discern, but you’re fairly sure it isn’t hatred anymore.

They’re real and the clothes on your back are real. Your jacket is real, growing sideburns and tired eyes. Real, real, real.

Real.

Dizzy’s back. So’s confused and disoriented. They’ve set up shop, they don’t want to leave.

“Maybe...maybe just a check-up.”

Going down.

Over and  _out_.

*-*-*

“...You must’a decided to leave then.” A voice says, rough from years of drink and  _scream_  just as you seem to zone in and hear it. “Well, come  _back_ , from what Cartwright’s been whining on about since...”

Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.

“Maybe you had to choose. I can understand that. What’s 1973 compared to the technological-drug-filled-crack-lead-pussy-footing-government-era of 2007, eh?”

Feet move, from left to right, striding around the small room. Old shoes squeak and stick to the static ground. You saw him less than a few hours ago, telling you to  _sod off to sleep before you fall on your face, Tyler._

“Are you there now? Have you...see, way I remember it, you died, for us, with us.”

_How, how, HOW?_

He can’t hear you, you can’t hear you. You’re not even speaking, you’re thinking. You’re screaming at nothing more than darkness and a voice far away.

“Maybe you’ll remember when you wake up. Maybe you won’t.”

_Tell me!_

“Figured was best to come now, in case you thought  _I_  was the insane DCI spinning stories, instead of you.” He tries to laugh but you hear it die on his lips. “Which reminds me, congratulations. Suppose you weren’t wrong when you said it was your best moment; getting that promotion.”

In your head, you smile. When in actuality, reality—no matter what year, you’re either catatonic or drooling in your sleep, sprawled out across your desk at work or bed at home—with a crick in your neck waiting when morning comes.

He’s rambling, which in itself is strange since by now he’s either been interrupted, or reminded of the job at hand. You suppose, in silence, hearing only, that this is the job at hand.

“They said you weren’t there any more, a vegetable. I said you were more of a fruit-cake, but they wouldn’t listen. Wasn’t the same after, and not because you were special or mighty, or that there was any truth to your holier than thou act, it would have been different no matter who had...”

He pauses in his excuse, and you can imagine him pursing his lips, catching them on his teeth, swallowing saliva and taking a deep breath. In your imagination, the only thing that’s really changed is his hair colour. You can’t see him as a fragile old man, only the tall and broad Gene Hunt.

Fingers trail across the wheeled table at the bottom of the bed. They wander over a pitcher of water, and line the rim until the glass whistles. He runs his finger along the glass faster and faster until the whistling is more like a high pitch whine and just as the sound’s ringing in your ears...it stops.

“We were better, ‘cause of you, and thinking about it, I hope you didn’t completely mess up history. Seems like something you’d do, you moron.”

He sighs and it hurts your ears to hear him sound so...dejected.

The ventilator shaft rises and falls, followed by the slow repeat of a chest.  _Your_  chest. The machine breathing for  _you_  because you’re too busy chasing after 70’s bad guys to keep your O2 levels steady. You’re not breathing for yourself; and that wasn’t your decision to make either.

“I always thought you were different, but I got used to you being a pain in the arse, Sammy-boy.”

The metal legs of a chair scrape along the linoleum floor of a room inside St. James’ Hospital. That same chair squeaks as someone sits atop the uncomfortable plastic.

“Told your mum I was on old friend. She gave me this look, like she knew me, and I gave her the same. I don’t think she caught on to you having been there though, so you’re safe.”

The air seems thinner as the proximity between you and your visitor is shortened.

“Cartwright...Annie, she said...she told me a little. Not much, not enough, but she said to go easy on you in the woods. Remember that? She said you weren’t yourself; needed help. I said you’re always acting like that but she was being serious.”

Another pause.

“You got people high up watching your career, you know, so when...people noticed, Sam. They did. Chris says you were innovative. And I bet he got that word from you.”

Their breath isn’t stuck, but there’s a slight hitch that reminds you of a child hiding hiccups. The silence drags on, when he doesn’t know what to say; how to say it. A second chance and he can’t blow it.

“I just thought you were a nut job. I should have listened earlier, Tyler...Sam, I’m sorry, but, I guess you made your choice and I should...I need to respect that. I can, Sam. I think.”

You wake up as the voices fade away. You hear a door swing open in your head just as Gene Hunt bashes through the door to your flat.

He’s got a lead, you presume.

“We got the bastard.” He tells you, grinning still, referring to your main suspect in your current murder case from down by the docks. You blink wearily, as current, past and...what?  _Alternate timeline_ , voices mesh into one.

“Get your arse in gear, Sammy-boy.”

Except that one.

  
_His_  voice is always clear to you.

*-*-*

You yawn as the dream fades away. You look around and think,  _I’m back._

You must be, you heard Gene, he’s already told you how the story ends. He’s already said, so it must happen like that. Not that you understand time travel in the slightest, but that’s beside the point. Your dreams, they warned you you’d have to choose and somehow unwillingly you have and you’re back.

Your mother who promised never to leave your side must be away getting coffee or sleeping, god you hope she’s slept. You hope she’s well. She must be right outside those doors.

But as soon as you think of one female in your life, your mind wanders to others. To a girl you’ve let go of and to one you’d only just gotten hold of. You worry about all the things you’ve yet to say, yet to do and see done. And you think of Annie, dear Annie,  _oh Annie, you came and you gave without taking._

That’s Mandy, you berk.

Get it together, eye on the prize, keep up, eyes peeled, first things first; you’re not dead. That’s gotta be a plus? Surely?  _I’m serious and don’t call me Shirley_.

You feel as though you’ve been asleep for days, your body’s heavy and tingling. Your mouth tastes like cotton wool and your ears ring; head swimming, eyes closed.

“He seems to be alright, he was quite dehydrated when he was brought in, and it appears he was suffering from sleep deprivation.” You hear a wise man say, muffled by walls beyond your reach. You can practically see his frown, his possible glare. “I’d like to keep him in a little longer, to be sure there’s really nothing else wrong. No lasting damage.”

“You what?”

Wait, that’s...that’s no one from 2007. You blink, because damn, that sure as hell sounded a lot like...

“You said it yourself, he’s fine, so I expect him to be fine or I’ll be arresting your for pissing off a senior officer!” That last part’s shouted and you roll your eyes as you stare at the door.

Those doors. Blue doors. Swinging doors that lead to a long corridor with blinking lights and swinging fixtures. If you thought you were worried before...well, now the walls are white. And the sheets are white, and the beeping is closer than it’s ever been, so are the machines. And the single bedside table.

The closed doors in front of you.

You think of June for the first time in weeks.

And then you think of catheters and spilling and fear and you’re shaking again, panicking and the beeping is louder and screaming in your ears and why is everything so damn LOUD?

Breathing is harder than you remember. In, out, in, out, in, I can’t, I won’t, I’m scared, oh god, in, or is it out? Didn’t you already breathe in? Isn’t it out this time? Or is it in? Does it matter? Breathe you idiot, breathe!

“Mr. Tyler!” The doctor exclaims, rushing in and holding your shoulders. “Look at me, Mr. Tyler, calm down, it’s alright.”

“What the bloody hell’s wrong with him?”

“It’s possible he’s suffering from hallucinations, when the body isn’t taken care of—

“You said he was fine!” Gene shouts, stepping forward, closer to the bed.

“Sam! Listen to me, stop it, nothing’s wrong, you’re in the hospital, remember? Fainted like a sissy? Went down like a bag of potatoes?” He clicks his fingers in your face and you splutter out a breath of hot air.

In, out, in, out, in, out.

  
_“There, not so difficult, now is it, Sam?”_ You imagine the professor on your television say, patronisingly as he stands in front of a black board scrawled with chalked formulas of Pythagoras and more.

You fall back against the covers and make your decision. Split-second, no going back.

You sleep and decide to breathe on your own.

You stay.

  
_-Fin._   


  
__  



End file.
